The White House Wants to Make the Smithsonian a Pariah

The Trump administration’s latest strategy to control the Smithsonian has the logic of lunchroom bullying; the Department of Interior is channeling “you can’t sit with us” energy as it tries to make the world’s largest museum complex a pariah in Washington.

In a newly public August 28 letter from the department to the Smithsonian board of regents, Trump-administration officials write that executive departments and agencies “cannot in good conscience continue to support the Smithsonian under current leadership” and suggest that they cease cooperation with the Smithsonian on routine logistical matters, such as loaning items for exhibits and awarding discretionary grants.

The letter was sent just days before the regents, having failed to secure an open site on the National Mall for the Smithsonian’s newest museums, resorted to placing the National Museum of the American Latino in a largely vacant building it already owns.

In doing so, the Smithsonian dodged Congress, a move that reflects the inward turn of an institution on the outs.

Such developments illustrate the growing alienation the Smithsonian faces in the capital and difficulties that go deeper than the superficial signage Donald Trump wants placed in front of one of its museums to discredit it .

For the past year and a half, the White House has repeatedly threatened the institution, but recently, more parties have joined the effort—first Republicans in Congress who in two hearings scrutinized the National Museum of American History over supposed partisan bias, and now the Interior Department, which has no official oversight of the Smithsonian.

Although partially government-funded, the Smithsonian is independent of the executive branch—the White House has essentially no say over what it does—and it was designed to be as such.

Still, it’s becoming clear that functioning freely in this charged climate might also mean going it alone.

Invoking the White House’s recent report on the Museum of American History, the Interior letter accuses the Smithsonian of potentially violating federal antidiscrimination laws—a common way, on the right, of criticizing DEI programs, especially those created in response to the racial-justice protests of the late 2010s and early 2020s.

Signed by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy Vince Haley, the letter also requests a meeting with the board of regents, the entity that actually oversees the institution.

The regents’ membership has been shrinking this year as members’ terms have ended and their positions have gone unfilled, reportedly due to administration pressure .